The Delhi High Court has sought responses from the Centre and the Staff Selection Commission (SSC) on a plea challenging a government order prohibiting discussion, analysis, or circulation of the “contents of question papers of ongoing/held examinations…on social media”. “You can’t put such gag orders.you can’t discuss the paper?” HC Chief Justice D K Upadhyaya orally remarked on Wednesday (October 8). The SSC makes recruitments to various ministries and departments of the Union government and attached and subordinate offices at the level of Group B posts and lower. The division Bench of CJ Upadhyaya and Justice Tushar Rao Gedela was hearing a PIL seeking the quashing of a notification issued by the SSC on September 8, warning “all content creators, social media platforms, and individuals…not to indulge in discussion, analysis, or dissemination of SSC examination question papers or their contents in any manner”. The notification said that violations would “invite strict penal action under the…provisions of the Public Examinations (Prevention of Unfair Means) Act, 2024, in addition to other applicable laws”. Petitioner Vikas Kumar Mishra, an engineering graduate who is a resident of Uttar Pradesh and claims to be a “public spirited citizen”, submitted that no action had been taken on his formal representation to the Commission requesting withdrawal of the notice. Mishra argued that “nowhere in the said Act the act of discussion, analysis and dissemination of question paper which has already been conducted by (SSC) has been treated as an unfair means”. He has also submitted that the provisions of the Act “never intended to punish the acts of discussion and analysis of the examination after the exam has been conducted and hence the same does not come within the ambit of Unfair means as defined under Section 3 of the Act”. The SSC’s September 8 notification cited sections 3 (unfair means), 9 (nature of offences), and 10 (penalties) of the 2024 Act. The notification said that Section 3 “prohibits leakage, disclosure, access, possession, or dissemination of question papers, answer keys, or any part thereof without authority”. The matter will be taken up again on December 17.
